288 Inaugural Address by the President of the Society, 



be discovered or examined hereafter. Of these there were probably 

 a considerable number in the same neighbourhood. Within a radius 

 of six or seven miles from Rushmore I have counted twelve or 

 thirteen places in which Roman remains had been found, some of 

 them apparently villages of equal size to those above-mentioned, 

 and, judging by my experience at Woodyates, there were probably 

 several more which may have been entirely destroyed by cultivation. 

 In fact, this district, which is now very sparsely inhabited, was in 

 Roman times a very populous one. This may have been partly 

 owing to the fact that at a time when so much of the country was 

 in forest the people were obliged to live in the open downlands, that 

 are now comparatively deserted. But this is hardly sufficient to 

 account for such a great concentration of Romano-British people in 

 this district, towards the close of the Roman occupation. We must 

 look to the effects of wars and invasions as a cause for the density 

 of the population at that time. 



These considerations make it important that we should endeavour 

 to ascertain what connection existed between these villages and the 

 great military earthworks of the neighbourhood, such a number of 

 which are shown on the ancient map of the district that I have 

 made. 1 



I have frequently heard observations made upon this subject 

 which appear to me, from a military point of view, to be erroneous. 

 The isolated camps, with which the map is studded, which — though 

 called camps — were in reality permanent fortifications, are sometimes 

 spoken of as having been thrown up for the defence of a particular 

 district. But, apart from the fact that they are pretty evenly dis- 

 tributed over the country, occupying the most elevated positions as 

 they happen to occur, and not in lines drawn along the frontier of 

 any particular part, there is reason to doubt whether such detached 

 fortresses could, in those days, have served the purpose of defending 

 a district. In modern times we erect fortresses on the frontiers of 



1 This map was exhibited at the Meeting, and will be reproduced in the third 

 quarto volume of excavations, giving detailed plans and sections of all the ex- 

 cavations, with illustrations of the objects discovered in Woodyates. 



